"What is electronic performance support?"

If your reading this there's a good chance you already know the answer but I was asked this question again by a friend, After reading my blog. So, just in case you are asking the same question...

Think about it this way... When you first started at your new job, did you need to learn how to use any new software? An accounting system, customer relationship managment tool, Microsoft product, or otherwise? Do you remember how frustrating it was trying to figure out how to complete your tasks quickly? How many times did you ask different people the same questions so they wouldn't know you forgot.... again...?.?.?

EPSS or Electronic Performance Support Systems are esentiallly designed to provide you with immediate help within the software application your using at the "TIME OF NEED." Allowing you to complete the task immediately vs. asking co-workers or going searching for assistance in help files.

The Problem is finding the Right Information...Downtime due to an inability to find relevant, job task-specific information remains a huge obstacle to worker productivity. Consider these statistics from a recent IDC report:

• Knowledge workers spend an average of 15% to 20% of their time looking for information.
• Success rates are less than 50%.
• Unsuccessful searches in a company employing 1,000 knowledge workers could cost as much as $6,000,000 in time loss annually.

Another survey of technology workers , in this case IT professionals and programmers, concluded that 100% of those surveyed reported having to stop working at one or more times per day to find answers and look for solutions to job-related problems. Of those surveyed, 20% reported having to stop 10 or more times per day. When totaled, this equates to at least 50 interruptions per week.

The study concluded further that technology workers spend approximately seven hours per week looking for answers and researching solutions to problems. Over the course of a month, this represents more than 31 hours of technology worker downtime. When measured across an enterprise of 500 technology workers, the costs of worker downtime could equate to as much as $7.5 million per year—a staggering impact to profitability.

Addressing the Problem

So how is this problem being addressed? The answer is, simply, not very well. Despite significant research that confirms that most worker learning takes place outside of the classroom, organizations continue to rely largely on costly instructor-led training as a primary solution. A recent Training Magazine industry report provided some interesting statistics pertaining to how training budgets are being allocated. In calendar year 2005:

• $51.1 billion was budgeted for formal training.
• 70% of that budget was allocated to classroom instruction with live instructors.
• $13.5 billion was spent on training products and services, up $.2 billion from the previous year.
• 26% said that training budgets were up from the previous year.

Costs for continuous employee development are enormous. However, in spite of continued trends toward allocation of training budgets to formalized classroom instruction, the tide is now beginning to turn. There is significant discussion and debate in learning circles about the effectiveness of formal learning, and greater emphasis is being placed on more informal, process-embedded approaches to learning among industry thought leaders.

Performance support systems have, whether deserved or not, had the reputation of being rather costly to design and implement, which is one of the primary reasons for their only recent emergence as credible alternatives to established training paradigms. Furthermore, the rapid emergence of performance support is being fueled by recent advances in technology. This is allowing organizations to deliver highly effective, process-embedded resources in ways that were simply not possible just a year ago.

So now you are starting to see the light... to be continued...